The sea was really cold but on the way back to the house the sand was extremely hot – this was some hours before the image was caught. Right now there are a series of wii tennis games happening which is being shown on a projector screen which is very cool.
Lots of work done today too. And Ryan can indeed cook damn fine steak.
Yesterday at WordCamp Matt Mullenweg asked Matt Cutts about Text Link Ads on blogs. I have Text Link Ads and have done for some time. I never thought that they wanted me to link because my content matched theirs – to think that is stupid. It’s Page Rank all the way and to be honest I didn’t care (still don’t) because they are paying me to occupy that small space. But because these people pay me money and those people have PR in mind Google doesn’t like it. Google’s ball park, Google’s rules and the rules are going to apparently hit sites who have these links.
So Google knock me down to a 6 or a 5. The link buyers don’t want me and go – I lose money. I decide to not renew ads to keep my PR and I lose money. It’s not a huge deal as it was never counted into any budget but I lose either way. Google does not want me to get money to promote something that would not get that exposure without the money being behind it.
So a site that does figure in their results is not allowed to try and get higher by paying a blogger for advertising space. But what about a site that does not figure at all in their results paying someone else to get not just some exposure but the most visible exposure?
Their game, their rules.
Right now it’s really easy to see the TLA but would they know if I slotted them into my blogroll? Yes, of course they would. Google has the technology to come to my site and figure out that my link to Podrunner is a genuine link but the one to some directory is not. It could penalise that directory in some way that allowed the blogger to make cash but which did not harm the PR. It has that power. But it does not want to share that pie. It wants it all and it will take it. Their games, their rules.
It’s telling of course that the very people who work for TLA will not have their sites using their own product but that is not the issue. The issue is that Google are saying that they want the ad cash and bloggers shall not be allowed it.
Do I care about PR? Yes because the cash is nice because I’m a 7. No because when I search for it I have to wade through a heap of junk to find the results I do want. And it’s not sponsored links that are causing the junk (what is does not matter right now) so if sponsored links are not impeding my experience of using Google then why hit me with that stick just because it’s an incredibly easy stick to use? How many bloggers actually use TLA? Is blogging really hurting Google (because by definition PR is Google) to the point that they do this? Is blogging – or rather a few links on well-structured sites – so powerful that Google cannot do anything else? Are they backed into a corner? No – they just cannot be bothered / don’t care / want to be greedy.
Better people than me will have dissected and argued this and this post is not going to change a damn thing but I’ve always hated hypocrisy despite Matt Cutts being a nice guy and a very entertaining speaker what came out of those last few minutes of presentation seems wrong.
(The two ‘sponsored links’ above I cannot find in a Google search with 100 results for ‘text link ads’ if I block ads.)
I’m sitting on the stairs earlier and this guy asks me what I would like to be if I could be anything for a day.
He laughed at my answer.
Very nice indeed. Proper size cans of Red Bull are good too.
I was already in sleep overdraft before I came over and I’ve had little sleep so far so the above are and will be useful.
The evening was spent at Taylor’s Automatic Refresher on the waterfront. Pretty busy, met Niall Kennedy, Patrick Havens, Scott Beale, Glenda, Mrs Sarah Jaquith. And today it’s the event itself.
Sitting in Union Square before 8am with a coffee and wifi was very cool. Have been told it is cold in SF so when wandering around with Donncha I buy a jacket/hoodie type thing. Sun promptly shines brightly. Met Charles Stricklin of WordPress Podcast fame(who I’ve chatted to in #wordpress for ages), met Lorelle, John Dvorak, Demitrius and Toni (again) from Automattic, Aaron Brazell and Mark Jaquith at cafe/bookstore across from Pier 38 for I think it was close to 3hrs of WP discussion. Donncha took a few pics. And now it’s close to 6pm and we are back at the Pier with laptops open. While Andy and Barry play pool.
The clock on the laptop says Friday 0600 but it’s really 10pm here in a slightly breezy SF. Scary takeoff at Heathrow. Very bumpy immediately after lift-off, plane dipped/dropped – not turned – to one side which was odd. Worst take-off I’ve had. Uneventful from there really.
And now I’ve met Maya who I briefly met last year, Joseph Scott, Alex Shiels and Nikolay Bachiyski who are new to the company, tomorrow Demetrius and from there it’s a pre-WordCamp day followed by 2 days of the event itself. Hopefully the current sleep overdraft will not need fulfilling until next week some time.
I am after suggestions for helpdesk software to help me do my work at wordpress.com
I don’t want to dismiss or have a go at the program I’m using right now because it’s been part of the learning curve and it has enabled support to scale – a year ago when I started there were less than 200,000 users and Thunderbird did the job for me. Now we will hit a million blogs inside a month – we passed a million users already. At some point Support will need to be more than just me and in that respect the less software gets in the way the better it is.
Right now, the program I’m using needs another screen for a tag to be created, the ticket screen to be hard-refreshed, the ticket needs to be saved to make the tag ‘stick’ and then I can reply. Lot of clicks. I have my doubts on the search and the items below in what I don’t want are there.
So, what do I want it to do….. here’s my desired workflow:
I need
What don’t I need:
Does it have to be Web 2.0, ajaxy, open-source and any other ‘cool’ factor? No.
Does price/license matter? Not yet but they do not equal good necessarily.
Am I after something built to a spec? No.
The deciding factor? It just has to work. But it has to work very well – I can be picky.
Support is very very simple – people want answers, you supply them. That’s it. So the software should let me do that quickly and effectively.
I’ve probably missed something from the above so if I remember I’ll add it.
New plugin installed below – WP-Zeitgeist by Whoo. As someone who never ever looks at stats but who used to be amused as to how people arrived here it’ll be a diverting plugin to watch. It shows the search terms that brought them here from a search engine. In time the text should increase / decrease in size and also in colour (Whoo – can we have that cloud class for the LastFM one?). Neat plugin.
Been futzing with the theme too. Apologies if when you dropped by at the few moments when I broke this css and the blue blob showed. There are some changes for me but I doubt you’ll notice. I want a theme. I like veryplaintxt but it has some defaults I really don’t like so possibly…… A bare bones Gemini is what’s needed I think. Something to play with at some time.
And tomorrow I ring Breed316 to get a custom 7mm barbell (paracetamol shaped base, smartie top) made for my tongue. I am almost convinced that the day after he has posted it the one I already own but have ‘lost’ will turn up. The last one cost me somewhere around £30 I think so 2 the same at that point would be pointless. And then my attention will turn to 8mm.
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